I did three round ups to close out 2022 and then I went on a two week break from work where I consumed more media per day (probably) than I had in the 351 days that proceeded it. So here is one more round up. It is a lot of catching up on things I wanted to get to, picks from other people’s best of list, or movies we finally got to watch because we were finally all home together for a stretch.
Nope - After showing up five years late to Get Out we decided to throw Nope and Us on our backlog. This is certainly not up to the quality of Get Out, but it is fun, weird, and handcrafted in the same vein. (B-)
Severance - This was right at the top of my “return to it in 2023” list. Well it didn’t take long. The first two days of 2023 were a binge of what is now a contender for my favorite show of 2022. (A)
Die Hard - Old trailers do themselves zero favors with my children. I pitched this for a week straight before the kids sat down and enjoyed the hell out of this classic. (A)
Citizen Sleeper - This might be the second best game I played in 2022. Excellent writing, storytelling, and world building. All wrapped up in a set of game mechanics that evoke my favorite parts of a tabletop RPGs. Also it is “free” on Game Pass if you have it. (A)
Glass Onion - I loved Knives Out, but some how watched it without my wife. I swear she fell asleep for it and she swears I watched it without her. In any case we watched and enjoyed this together with her having not seen the original. It is over the top compared to Knives, but still good fun. I love the idea of Rian Johnson and Daniel Craig doing 10 more of these Agatha Christie style (his words, not mine). (B)
Knives Out - Of course we had to watch this the next day. We probably should have started with it. It holds up and is still great. (A)
The Initiative - We don’t play board games in our house really. We like the idea, but we also keep a very busy sports and activity schedule. Forced family fun time (FFFT) is not something we enact generally because everyone doing their own thing is important too. However the holidays are an FFFT free for all (FFFTFFA) and we spent a lot of that time playing this fun coop codebreaking legacy game. (A)
High On Life - If I wasn’t all in on Game Pass this would be a highly skippable game. The association with one of the Rick and Morty creators was enough to peak my interest though. It is an OK shooter, with OK jokes, that overstays it’s welcome. (C-)
Spirited - The Ryan Reynolds schtick teeters on a knife’s edge of endearing or annoying. This squarely falls into endearing holiday musical. (B-)
Dying Light 2 - One can only play so many open world games a year. I thought this one would just pass me by, but a Steam sale caught last week and I had nothing, but time. The story and writing are B movie quality, but the parkour very good and the combat is not bad either. I don’t see myself finishing it, but overall enjoyable. (C+)
Moving Out - New Years Eve was just my wife and youngest home celebrating together. We asked him what he wanted to do and he said a video game we could all play. So we found this game on super sale on PSN. It was an OK to Good couch coop. It is no Overcooked, but still a laugh. (C+)